Thursday, March 3, 2011

At Least It's Not My Beautiful Mommy

Anonymous, you’ve put so much effort into warning about the perils of self publishing. Why bother? Considering none of them would even make it through into the real world of publishing anyway (therefore not affecting you)why are you so passionate about the subject?

I feel bad for people who are taken in by vanity presses and who end up repaid for their money and effort only in frustration.

Wouldn’t trashy self published books actually make what you do look better?

Most of my books look awesome whatever you put them next to.
You don't actually need the horribly bad contestants on American Idol to make the honestly talented contestants shine.

I agree most people should not attempt to self publish, but publishing companies have also put out some pretty crap books.

Well, that's the truth. But at least no one was deliberately swindled over those books.

I know because my daughter has devoured many thousands of books since the age of two (she was a very early reader), some of which have either bored her to tears or she has found mistakes not picked up by professional editors. In fact over time she has found quite a few and from the age of three she refused to read any books which had mistakes. At age ten she has over a thousand books (yes, one is a self published book that she refuses to part with.) Strangely enough it is the only book with mistakes she wants to keep because she said “at least it’s interesting”. The content would never be endorsed by a mainstream publishing company but this piqued the interest of child who tends to think outside the box. So to each his own.

I absolutely agree. Everyone is welcome to make as many mistakes as they like. But for those who would rather not make a mistake, a word to the wise is a simple kindness.

29 comments:

I have to say, the fact that out of over a thousand books this child has read, she has only found one self-published book worth keeping is pretty much a perfect illustration of what EA is talking about with regard to self-publishing. One book out of over a thousand is hardly a ringing endorsement of the self-publishing industry.

I won't put words in EA's mouth (god forbid:) but for me, I warn only of self publishers disguised as commercial publishers, that work to convince new writers into thinking they are being published, rather then printed. My hat is off to a self publishing writer who enters into the task of properly printing, marketing their work. It's the scummy business's that exist to entrap a naive writer that I have any sort of problem with.Publish America is the first that comes to mind but I know there are others.The idea of promoting and selling exhausts and frightens me just thinking of it, so self publishing is obviously not for me.

I know someone who self-published in the true sense of getting an ISBN and having a cover designed and funding a print run and even got the book into the local warehouse stores--and the book did just okay, in spite of much promotion, because it was, er, unreadable. People would pick it up out of curiosity or social pressure, but most couldn't finish it or didn't enjoy it. I think so-called gatekeepers or even a really honest crit group could have saved the author much time and money.

I guess my point is that even the non-scam forms of self-publishing are still riskier than traditional publishing because any but the humblest of authors are likely to skip a really effective screening process.

---And wow, to have read thousands of books by age 10 is voracious reading indeed. My voracious-reader kids probably read about 30-50 books a year (dependent on how well we at keeping their book supply stocked) and I thought that was a lot.

I actually know the author of My Beautiful Mommy. As disgusting as it sounds, its really not so bad.

He didnt make it to hook kids on plastic surgery. He did it to help the kids whose mothers are undergoing procedures,so they would understand whats happening.Tells them what to expect in the language a child would understand. So they wont be scared when mommy comes home in bandages or looks different.

Still says something undesirable about our society, but I dont think the book is so bad when you know what its about.

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